“Pop-Up Community Murals”

by the Owl Project

The Owl Project hosted the creation of five community murals during the September 2016 Pop-Up Downtown event. The organization worked with a local artist on the overall designs of each mural panel, then invited anyone in the community to come paint them. All five panels were painted in the course of three hours. It was an outpouring of community involvement, creativity and cooperation. These five panels will go up as a permanent art installation in the City of Renton, at a location soon to be determined.

The Owl Project is a locally-based, non-profit organization that seeks to bring communities together through the creation of public art. Although it is a fairly new organization, it has several projects in the works. The Owl Project is in the process of fundraising for its flagship project, a giant ceramic mosaic mural of an owl to be placed at a “to be determined” location in Renton. This mural will be created by elementary school kids in the Renton School District. The organization is working with a 5th grade class at Maplewood Heights Elementary to create a ceramic mosaic that will go up at the school. At Renton River Days 2016, The Owl Project had community members paint 250 4-inch ceramic tiles which will come together into a community mural in Renton later this year. As it works on community art, The Owl Project will also find more volunteers and interested members of the community who want to be a part of this kind of work. The Owl Project seeks to create a sense of empowerment and belonging among the members of the community FOR the places in which they live.